Bankruptcy – Britain’s newest export offers a way out for Irish debtors

Britain’s newest and potentially fastest-growing export in Europe is no other than bankruptcy. In particular, Irish entrepreneurs devoured by debt from a property boom gone wrong are taking advantage of Britain’s progressive and relatively less onerous bankruptcy laws to gain fast relief from crippling debt.

In Britain, bankrupts can be discharged within a year of declaring themselves bankrupt, whereas entrepreneurs declaring themselves bankrupt in Ireland have to wait 12 years before being discharged. In Ireland last year, there were around 29 bankruptcies compared with 79,000 in Britain. According to David Carson of Deloitte’s insolvency unit in Dublin: “The law is just incredibly penal“. But, as under European Union law, Irish debtors/ European Union states’ citizens, can file for bankruptcy anywhere in Europe, Irish debtors are flocking to Britain where they can be rid of their debt within 12 months. As a result, in Dublin, ‘bankruptcy tourism’ is the hottest conversation in town among struggling business folk.

The Guardian reports Frances Coulson, vice-president of insolvency professionals’ trade body R3, commenting: “People can come to the UK to take advantage of our bankruptcy rules just as we might go to Poland to get our teeth done.”